Big Boy Did It and Ran Away (20 page)

‘Exactly, Gary.’

‘It’s Charlie, sir.’

‘Charlie. Whatever. He’s not getting any. And you better believe Titania, being the queen of the fairies, is one hell of a shag to be doing without.’

Ray looked around the class, where the expressions of confusion and amused disbelief told him they had been collectively outflanked and he was, for once, in control. Whether he’d still have a job by the time they’d told their parents and were next due on his timetable remained to be seen.

He walked to the blackboard, seizing the moment.

‘So let’s recap before we recommence our reading. A few keywords to write down. First one: shagging.’

The board was still covered in text from a previous lesson, a colleague inflicting one of Ted Hughes’s animal cruelty collection on his unfortunate charges. Ray reached for the duster, but it was missing from its rest. Instead he grabbed one of the section dividers and hauled down the next panel with a squeak of the rollers. There was a four‐
foot cartoon knob staring back, the spunk blobs spurting towards him at head height.

The laughter was like a wall of water, crashing against him and making it impossible to turn around.

What to do next, he told himself, was the kind of test that distinguished the experienced pro from the floundering newbie. The former would, perhaps, simply roll the board on to another panel and pretend nothing untoward had happened; maybe crack a joke about what the last class had been learning, dispel any sense of confrontation. The more authoritarian might freak out and go into full intimidatory investigative mode, threatening every clichéd repercussion and turning the uproarious atmosphere into one of fear and regret. Ray, of course, didn’t have a fucking clue, but was sure that it augured poorly for his future in this career that he found the incident funnier than anyone else in the room. He knew also that if he let himself start laughing, he’d end up on his knees, tears streaming down his cheeks, with the catastrophic side effect of sanctioning the knob motif in the eyes of the weans. It would be common knowledge by the end of playtime, and thereafter follow him around forever: jotters, essays, blackboards, folders, you name it. He might as well change his name to Mr Knob.

However, even a newbie can get jammy; pick up a railgun and nail someone point‐
blank out of sheer instinct or sheer luck. He can also, of course, pick up a rocket‐
launcher and fire it fatally into the nearest wall. Ray wasn’t aware of any thought process directing his actions, but found himself writing on the board, as though unfazed, only his handwriting betraying a slight tremble as he fought to suppress his own laughter. He wrote ‘shagging’ above the tip of the knob, and for a flourish, enclosed it in a bead shape so that it appeared to be part of the ejaculation. The guffaws continued, but the edge of onslaught had been blunted; they were well on their way to laughing with.

‘What else did we say?’ he asked, hoping no‐
one was observant enough to spot the tears welling up. ‘Come on?’

‘Nob and Tit,’ someone responded.

‘Nob and Tit.’ He wrote that too, encircling it in another bead, arcing along the same trajectory. ‘Any more?’

‘Oberon not gettin’ his hole, sir.’

‘“Not getting any”, very good.’

‘Fanny, sir.’

‘That’s right, the dark forest.’

‘Big donkey’s wullie, sir.’

‘Of course, how could we forget the importance of the phallus, as has been so beautifully illustrated here by someone with a deep understanding of the play. Now, have you all written this down?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And have you all drawn a knob?’

Head‐
shakes and unsteady giggling all round.

‘Come on, then. Get on with it.’

Ray folded his arms impatiently and waited. Eventually they realised he wasn’t kidding, and set pen to paper.

‘All done now? Hold them up where I can see them.’

Twenty‐
eight jotters were held aloft, all having faithfully and diligently completed the exercise.

‘Good. Now, I think we’re ready to resume reading. Kylie, I believe it was your line.’

Kylie, unfortunate spawn of the late Eighties, fumbled for the book, then recommenced the group assault on the undefended verse. Ray walked to the door, causing the next reader to stop.

‘Keep it up. I’m just nipping outside for a second, but I’ll still be listening. Go on.’

Ray closed the door quietly, the sound of a lisping Lysander muffled behind him, then unleashed a lung‐
crumpling sigh. He waited for his own laughter to begin, but it didn’t come. It might yet ambush him later on, but for now it seemed he had succeeded in stemming the flow. Pity, really. Maybe he’d get the benefit later when he told Kate, or maybe it had just seemed all the funnier because he knew he couldn’t laugh at the time. He remembered a truly fearsome Maths teacher with an intimidating resemblance to Oliver Reed, in whose class the most infantile whispered remark could seem eye‐
streamingly hilarious through the terror of incurring his volcanic wrath and his unrivalled belt‐
technique.

After a few minutes, Ray reckoned he was ready to go back into the class, where, miraculously, the play was still being read aloud. Best to be sure, though. He tried visualising the giant chalk knob, remembering the impact of that moment when it suddenly appeared. A smile crept over his face, letting him know the giggles were still too close to the surface. Another few moments, then.

There were footsteps approaching along the corridor, quick and deliberate. Adult, male, plural, he guessed. Bugger. He didn’t fancy explaining his unscheduled break to another member of staff, so he decided he’d just have to take a deep breath and plunge back in.

The breath, as it turned out, was too deep. They were round the corner and in sight as he gripped the handle.

‘Mr Ash?’

It was indeed two men, but not members of staff. He didn’t know all the teachers by face or name yet, but he knew how they dressed, and this pair were far too smartly suited and booted. Polis would have been his guess, even if they weren’t holding up warrant cards, which were in themselves less confirmatory than the standard‐
issue moustaches.

‘I’m Sergeant Boyle, this is DC Thorpe, Special Branch.’ The accent was English, maybe Lancashire. Ray felt his insides tighten. This was it: they were going to charge him with wasting police time, and they’d sent the heavy squad in to make it as intimidating as possible. ‘We need to speak to you about the incident last night.’

‘I’m in the middle of a class at the moment. I’ll be free in about ten minutes.’

‘We need you to come with us right now, Mr Ash. It’s a very serious matter.’

‘I didn’t make it up.’

‘We know. That’s why we’re here.’

Ray didn’t know how to react. Vindication would have felt good last night, especially with that smug cop sitting across the table, but now their confirmation just brought the reality of the danger back down like an anvil.

Boyle put a leading hand on his shoulder.

‘What about my class?’

‘We’ve spoken to your boss, it’s been cleared.’

‘Is someone coming down?’

‘Yeah. Come on.’

‘So did you find something? A witness?’

‘We’d best wait till the station to talk, Mr Ash.’

They walked very briskly out of the school, that no‐
nonsense cop‐
stride that exuded self‐
importance with every pace. Thorpe diverted at the front exit ‘to bring the Head up to speed’, while Boyle led Ray out to a grey Rover and ushered him into the back seat before taking the wheel himself. Thorpe emerged from the building a couple of minutes later and climbed into the rear next to Ray, upon which Boyle turned around and stuck a silencer‐
fitted automatic into Ray’s chest.

‘Fuck me.’

‘Give him your car keys or I will,’ he ordered.

Thorpe – presumably now not his real name – was already patting Ray down, removing his keys and mobile phone from his inside jacket pocket.

‘What is it you want from me, for fuck’s sake?’

‘These’ll do for just now, mate,’ probably‐
not‐
Thorpe replied, a hint of Scouse revealed in his accent. ‘Which motor is it? And don’t fuck us about unless you really want to know what a bullet in the nuts feels like.’

‘Black Polo,’ Ray said, trying to sound swiftly cooperative.

‘Which one?’

‘The fucked one.’

Thorpe exited, then there was a clunk as Boyle engaged the central locking. He withdrew the pistol and put the car into gear.

‘The bullet in the nuts offer stands until further notice, okay?’

‘While stocks last,’ Ray mumbled.

The car turned left out of the car park and promptly pulled up behind a massive lorry, parked about a hundred yards from the school gates, a ramp leading to its rear.

‘No tantrums, please, Mr Ash,’ Boyle said, taking the keys out of the ignition. ‘Best to conserve your energy.’

‘What fucking energy?’ Ray said, watching Boyle head up the ramp.

He hauled open the roller‐
shuttered door then returned to drive the car up into the container. Once inside the truck, Boyle got out of the Rover again, locked the vehicle and walked away.

Ray tried the doorhandle but it merely bent back and forth with no effect. He tried walloping the side window with his elbow a few times, but it was clear which one would break first, and anyway, if he climbed out, where the hell was he going to go? He looked out of the rear windscreen, expecting to see Boyle close the shutter. Instead he saw his own car rolling up behind the Rover, Thorpe at the wheel.

‘Pricks.’

What did they want with his car? And what the bloody hell did they want with him? They weren’t cops, yet they knew about last night, so they had to be connected, but last night they were trying to kill him and today they were abducting him; disappearing him, even.

The roller‐
shutter was pulled down at the rear, leaving him also in literal darkness. He knew he should have been more fearful for his life, but the sense of threat was clouded by his having no idea where or who the threat was coming from. Inexplicable as it was, however, he could forget all that mince about subconscious projection and stress‐
related hallucinations. The events of last night may have passed in a panic‐
fuelled blur of action, emotion and instinct, easily confused and jumbled in the memory, but right now he was conscious, composed and alert, and he was quite definitely locked in a car, quite definitely locked in a lorry, having quite definitely been abducted at gunpoint.

It occurred to him to keep track of the turns and attempt to picture the route from memory, but the Rover’s suspension did too good a job of cushioning the lorry’s movements. He checked his watch so that he’d at least have some idea of how far he was travelling. After that, there was nothing to do but sit in the dark and ponder his situation, though even baffled contemplation needed information to fuel it, and he was fresh out.

Ray searched the most tender recesses of his conscience for traces of what he might have done to bring this upon himself, but was coming up well short. He didn’t have any enemies; certainly none that he was aware of, and it was difficult to imagine generating this level of animosity without noticing. The only people he had even argued with in recent times had been online opponents, and even among the less stable of them, their idea of retribution extended to spamming poorly spelled insults in IRC chat‐
rooms or bombing your mailbox with bazillions of auto‐
generated messages. So what did that leave? Some Angel Heart alter ego leading an unconscious life of crime? Hard to see where he would have fitted that in around the nappy changes and floor‐
pacing. Had he witnessed something he wasn’t supposed to? Exhaustion and self‐
absorption could take their toll, but he still reckoned he would notice if an incident of mortal consequence happened in his line of vision.

Shit, of course! That had to be it: he’d forgotten to check his mail this morning for mistakenly addressed microfilms. There were probably nuclear launch codes lying on the doormat at that very moment, just waiting for Martin to spew all over them. Fuck, it was as likely as everything else that was going on at the moment.

He hadn’t crossed any drug‐
dealers, hadn’t racked up debts to some bloke with more scar tissue than Cher, hadn’t joined any subversive underground movements and hadn’t slept with anybody’s wife (seldom even his own these days, Mastitis Fetish magazine and Sex for the Sleep‐
Deprived not being on the household subscription list). He hadn’t even raised his voice in anger to another human being since …

Fuck. No. Don’t go there, m8.

So yes, owning‐
up time: he had slept with … well, she wasn’t the guy’s wife, just his girlfriend, but this was more than ten years ago. The statutory limitation would have been well exceeded even if the injured party hadn’t died in the meantime. And anyway, given the circumstances under which it happened, it wasn’t something that had exactly plagued Ray with guilt. If it had, it might have provided another explanation for what he’d imagined he saw at the airport, but it still wouldn’t explain this carry‐
on. Manifestations of conscience could reputedly be powerful things, but he didn’t remember Banquo’s ghost toting an automatic or kidnapping Macbeth in the back of a truck.

Nonetheless, the chronology demanded a connection. Since seeing/
not seeing/
imagining/
astrally projecting Simon Darcourt at the airport last night, Ray’s world had ceased to obey its normal rules: somebody had hacked the Real Life(tm) engine and left the server utterly borked. Was it entirely coincidental that the last time his life had gone anything like this crazy was the last time he and Simon’s paths had crossed?

Surely. But if anyone could possibly fuck you over from beyond the grave, it would be that vindictive bastard. Simon kept score of every slight, every dispute, every ‘disappointment’, to use his spine‐
curling term; never mind full‐
scale betrayal.

He hadn’t always been like that though. Well, maybe he had, but at least there had been a time when Ray was not so acutely aware of it.

Simon was the hero of the alsatian incident; you had to chalk that one up to him (though there had still been a casualty). Hillhead, nineteen‐
eighty‐
cannae‐
remember. First year. Ray had grasped the opportunity of broadening his horizons through higher education the way most good Scots lads did, by staying home at his mammy’s and commuting to the nearest uni on a daily basis. You could pick out the West‐
of‐
Scotland home‐
dwellers at ten paces, even without hearing their accents: they didn’t look malnourished, their eyes were bright from occasionally going to bed at a sensible hour and their clothes were always clean and ironed. The downside was that spontaneous, uncontrolled socialising – the quick pint following the last lecture that turned into a flat‐
party via two more pubs, a takeaway and the union disco, for some the entire purpose of university – was often curtailed by the logistical concerns of getting home to towns not particularly well‐
served by public transport during daylight hours, never mind three in the morning. The standard solution, when available, was to crash on somebody’s floor, an option particularly welcome on what used to be known as school nights.